Poet and memoirist Mark Doty, author of eight volumes of poetry and four nonfiction books, will read from his work Tuesday, September 16, at Washington College. Sponsored by the Sophie Kerr Lecture Series, the free event begins at 4:30 p.m.at the Rose O’Neill Literary House, 407 Washington Avenue.
Recognized as one of America’s most accomplished and influential poets, Doty has said that successful poems are “saturated with the texture of the uniquely felt life.” Pulitzer Prize winning poet Philip Levine wrote of Doty and his work, “If it were mine to invent the poet to complete the century of William Carlos Williams and Wallace Stevens, I would create Mark Doty just as he is, a maker of big, risky, fearless poems in which ordinary human experience becomes music.”
Doty’s first collection, Turtle, Swan, was published in 1987 in what one critic called “a stunning arrival.” His third book, My Alexandria(1993), earned Britain’s prestigious T.S. Eliot Prize, along with the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. And the 2008 Fire to Fire: New and Selected Poems drew accolades that included a National Book Award. In their citation, the Award judges described the poems as “elegant, plain-spoken, and unflinching,” inviting the reader to share “their ferocious compassion.”
Mark Doty’s next book of poetry, Deep Lane, is forthcoming from W.W. Norton. For more information on the poet, find his biography on the Poetry Foundation website, and visit www.MarkDoty.org.
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